Understanding the development of the human personality and soul
This is a truly Islamic Psychology which could be derived from revelation in the Qur'an and the Sunnah of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) even if western psychology had never come to exist.

How do you really define public indecency in a pluralistic society such as malaysia?

Answer:

The opinion at our website is that the rules for public indecency should be consistent with sharia. Hugging and kissing in public is not more or less indecent now than it has always been, only the feelings of the public as to how wrong it is perceived to be has changed due to the influences of secular materialism and Western cultural decadence. Human opinion does not determine right and wrong, only the Word of Allah can do that.

Basically there are two options, the lowest common denominator and the highest common denominator. The lowest common denominator would be according to the acceptable limits of the decadent Western culture derived from secular materialism; the highest common denominator would be according to the limits of the civilized Muslim culture derived from the sharia of Islam. This should not be presented as an issue of religion, it is a matter of high cultural morality versus low cultural morality. The non-Muslims in Malaysian society have as much to gain from the highest level of cultural morality as do the Muslims. We should always aspire to the highest and reject the lowest.

If a child lives with criticism, he learns to condemn.
If a child lives with hostility, he learns to fight.
If a child lives with ridicule, he learns to be shy.

If a child learns to feel shame, he learns to feel guilty.
If a child lives with tolerance, he learns to be patient.
If a child lives with encouragement, he learns confidence.
If a child lives with praise, he learns to appreciate.

If a child lives with fairness, he learns justice.
If a child lives with security, he learns to have faith.
If a child lives with approval, he learns to like himself.
Is a child lives with acceptance and frienship,
he learns to find love in the world.

Through the Khalifah Institute we always try to disseminate and promote the traditional beliefs and practices of Islam. Sometimes, though, I worry that perhaps because we so often use the language of modern science and technology to describe traditional Islamic belief and practice that there may be those who do not realize how closely we try to stay within the bounds of authentic Islamic scholarship.

To remedy what could otherwise come to be a misunderstanding as to the traditional authenticity of the Islamic knowledge we present to the world through the Khalifah Institute we thought it would be useful to present the ideas and words of some prominent Muslim scholars concerning many of the same Islamic concepts and issues which form the ideological basis of the Khalifah Project.

This volume reviews the writings of three prominent Muslim scholars of the 20th century. They are Sir Dr. Allamah Muhammad Iqbal, Dr. Ali Shariati, and Maulana Dr. Muhammad Fazl-ur-Rahman. I think it would be true to say that they are representative of the diversity of modern Islamic scholarship. In a later volume we will present the ideas and writings of various early Muslim scholars covering a similar range of Islamic Issues.

I could not say that we at the Khalifah Institute are in complete agreement with the ideas expounded by any of these three important scholars, but we are certainly in general agreement with most of the enlightened knowledge that all three of these scholars have contributed to the modern Muslim ummah.

None of these scholars, although they are all contemporary, write in the manner I do so you will find their choice of words very different than mine. Sometimes, perhaps, their words can be a little difficult to understand (although my writings must also occasionally suffer from that same malady).

I think you will find in the articles by these three outstanding Muslim scholars literally hundreds of instance where the ideas they are expressing are in complete agreement with the teachings of the scientific understanding of Islamic knowledge being disseminated through the Khalifah Institute. Additionally, the general Islamic worldview presented, and I would say consensually held, by all three scholars is virtually identical with the spiritual perspective behind the dawah activities of the Khalifah Project.